


Touch me deep

by daroos



Category: The Avengers (2012)
Genre: Community: trope_bingo, F/M, Feels, Mutant!Clint, Telepath, mindmeld
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-04-06
Updated: 2013-04-05
Packaged: 2017-12-07 14:46:22
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 2
Words: 3,974
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/749717
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/daroos/pseuds/daroos
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Clint knows that being amazing can get you places, but being different can get you killed.  Luckily, sharpshooters aren’t known for being touchy-feely folk, and Clint has gotten pretty good at hiding the fact he’s a mutant.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> WARNING -- The second chapter is actually a coda with warning for character death and sad feels. Think of it as a choose-your-own-adventure, and avoid it if you’d like. Nothing but a bit of Jossing in the first chapter.
> 
> Special thanks to eimearkuopio for a quick turnaround on the beta. As always, comments, thoughts or concrit are appreciated.
> 
> This will be used to fill my “Telepathy/mindmeld” square for Trope_Bingo.

Natasha had become accustomed to Clint’s touch over the years. They both wore armor and often gloves, so the palm-on-skin contact was rare. When it came, the tide of emotion washing through her was no longer unsettling.

Clint hid that he was different with an ease that Natasha recognized from herself. His habits were cultivated to avoid the direct contact that initiated an empathic link. His shooting glove covered most of the vulnerable skin on his right hand, while his left was often occupied with holding things: his bow, paperwork, his knife - anything, really. He often crossed his hands over his chest or behind his back when they were unoccupied, giving a veneer of professionalism or thought while cutting himself off from casual touch. Medical knew how touchy the assassin was with his fingers, so they would gently flatten his palm over medical gauze before inserting a cannula in the back of his hand, to avoid his carefully cultivated callouses.

The first time he had touched her was during her deprogramming, after he had initially brought her in. He’d wormed his way out of serious disciplinary action and snuck into the isolation room in which she was being held. She was strapped to her table quite securely, and more than slightly drugged. In spite of it, her heart raced when she saw him, with the desires to run and hide and fight all warring with each other. He had pulled up a chair and settled beside her, brow creased in worry, face a mish-mash of emotions.

“Come to gloat over your good work?” she had spat at him.

“Is that what you think?”

“I think you just want me for what I can do for you.” She leered back into his blue-grey eyes, making it clear she had meant it as a double entendre.

“Maybe,” he had replied thoughtfully. With careful motions he unclipped and removed his shooting glove, and the half glove he was in the habit of wearing. Dread coiled in Natasha at the innocuous, controlled motion. She didn’t know the reason for her certainty, but his movements had some deeper meaning. “I want you to have a better life,” he said, looking down at his gloves. Minute muscles twitched across his face, as though he was having some sort of deep internal conversation. He rose and tucked the gloves in his pants pocket, leaning lightly against her bed. 

He reached towards her face, slow like one would reach for a wild animal. She bared her teeth and snapped for his fingers, giving over to the animal fear and anger. He snaked his fingers out of her bite and pressed his right hand firmly to the side of her face. His thumb pressed lightly against the point of her chin; his fingers wove into her hair and around her ear, and his palm molded to the curve of her throat. She stilled, startled, and he took the opportunity to place his left hand on the other side of her head, thumb stroking at her temple. If he was going to snap her neck, there was very little she could do about it. She closed her eyes.

At that moment, she was blindsided by a wave of emotions rushing into her: hope and fear, amusement, frustration, worry and _love_. Until that moment, Natasha would have been unable to definitively say if she had ever been truly loved. This strange man who had shot her and convinced her to defect, though, showed her unequivocal proof. She opened her eyes to see him staring through her. He took his hands from her and framed her head with them. The rush of emotion disappeared, and he leaned in to kiss her forehead. “You can be your own woman here; you can be something great. Just give yourself the chance.”

He rose, and Natasha was appalled that her hand made a pinwheeling grasping motion towards him. She made a desperate mewling sound. He paused, looking conflicted, before sitting once more and taking her small hand in both of his. The warm fire of him burned through her and let her settle to sleep.

Later she learned what it had cost him in nightmares and pain. He hadn’t wanted to talk about it, but she had eventually forced the subject.

“It was like this storm of pain and confusion and I couldn’t find my way out of it.”

Natasha eyed him impassively. “You stayed, though.”

“You needed me,” he said simply, playing with the fingertips of his shooting glove. “I could help so I did.”

“So you did,” she agreed.

Since that day, Natasha had strived to be less like a swirling maelstrom of confusion and pain and more like the warm swell that defined Clint to her.

“Why do you want assignments with Barton?” the handler - Coulson- had asked her suspiciously. He handled Barton exclusively and was understandably dubious of her recent conversion.

“I trust him,” she replied shortly.

“He shot you.”

“He got me out of the Red Room.”

“That he did,” Coulson agreed evenly, signing a few papers and handing them to her. “You’ll be informed of our next meeting. Please don’t make me regret this.”

Natasha smiled wolfishly in response.

Empathy was not nearly as useful, tactically, as the more prominent telepathy practiced by Xavier and most of the rest of the mutant crew. Somehow Barton had slipped through the SHIELD cracks on X-factor testing, so his status as a probable mutant was never common knowledge. A few times, they had used it to communicate injuries when speech wasn’t an option. Once, he had used it as a lie detector on a dying HYDRA agent, nodding or shaking his head as Natasha asked questions, hands trembling on the operative. He’d gone briefly catatonic after that, palms reddened as though from bad burns and skin waxen and sweaty.

Natasha radioed in the information they had gotten and pulled Clint’s head into her lap. His pulse was steady and his eyes moved under their lids; quick, darting motions. She tried and failed to wake him. She trailed her fingers to his shoulder, picking up his arm and drawing his hand towards her.

Clint had told her once that thoughts were beyond him; it was what someone felt or experienced, emotionally or physically, that he could sense and project. She remembered the warmth of a fresh cup of tea, the smell of Clint’s overstuffed couch cushions, the sound of his electric razor on mornings when they had a bathroom, and laid her palm against his.

It was like acid and knives, like blistering heat and the cold flash of adrenaline and shock. It was like being skinned alive and burned from the inside out. He was caught in a replay of the HYDRA agent’s final moments; sickening fear, pain, a cold satisfaction, and more fear. She felt her jaw knotting at the continued exposure but maintained the contact, thinking of sharing a sleeping bag on snow-muffled mornings, the nutty smell of coffee that clung to Coulson’s suit jackets, and the blinding feeling of relief when an op was completed. That final feeling was what she focused on, using it to push back the tide of borrowed pain. 

It was over. “It’s over, Clint. Let him go.” She hadn’t been aware she was speaking, but Clint blinked up at her, confused. His palm was burning hot, and quite suddenly it all felt like an intrusion. She drew her hand away from his, only to have it chased after with weak movements. His head was still in her lap, and she clasped his hand gently and folded it down to rest against his chest. It hurt, but she could help, so she did.

\--

Sex was something Natasha did for operations; it was a tool and it was something she used. She was well aware of how her body worked, and she could orgasm with the same efficiency she brought to all other areas in her life. Her sex drive had never been monumental and satisfying it with a partner just seemed like a lot of trouble. 

Clint loved sex. Clint loved touching and being touched, even if it was with the backs of his knuckles and mouth to avoid a link. He loved becoming lost in physical sensation. He loved bringing her off and kissing her while he in turn came. They had a lot of sex. It helped Natasha when she was anxious and having difficulty sleeping. It helped Clint to get out of his own head, or when he was feeling out of place. It helped distract both of them when assignments weren’t coming as quickly as they would like.

Clint was adept at keeping his empathic capabilities out of it; he used his mouth to amazing effect and employed toys where that was impractical. He ran his knuckles up her ribs and caressed her face with the backs of his fingers.

“It feels like an invasion of privacy,” Clint admitted when she asked about it. “It feels like maybe I’m taking advantage or forcing intimacy. I’d never want to do that.”

Natasha enjoyed riding him; grinding her clit against his pubic bone and giving her hands free rein to roam his torso while he stretched for her, hands behind his head. She enjoyed controlling the rhythm and the pace. She liked that Clint would nip and suckle at her nipples when she leaned over him.

She reached for his left hand, carefully tucked behind his head against the desire to touch, and kissed the palm briefly. She did the same with his right, rocking over him the whole time. He looked up at her wondering, and she placed his hands on her hips.

The flow of sensation was almost too much; the feeling of being held between her legs, the roughness of his palms on hot, smooth skin, and a loving trust. His pupils, already dilated, blew even wider and his breath came in a gasp. They were caught for a long moment in a feedback loop of pleasure and trust. Natasha felt as though her heart could have easily stopped and she wouldn’t have noticed, she was so caught in the moment.

“Oh my god,” he gasped, fingers digging into the muscle and the soft pad of fat that rounded out her butt. “Oh, my—” He caught her eye. “Can I?” he asked, moving his hands upwards. She nodded. His hands moved to her waist, running over the heart-shape of her butt and coming back to her ribs. Wherever his palms moved a flood of shared sensation followed, and Natasha found the rough brush of calluses to be almost enough to make her come under the circumstances.

“I always wanted to do this,” Clint murmured, cupping her breasts and squeezing gently. They both gasped, and Natasha came with a groan. Clint was close behind her.

They both blanched when Clint got up for a wash rag and moved to re-establish contact as soon as possible. Clint tucked Natasha into him, back to front, Clint’s palm resting low enough on her belly that his fingertips barely tangled in her pubic hair.

They slept like that, cocooned in one another’s feelings of satiety and safety.

\--

Phil had known in the way he always seemed to know. Nothing was a secret from their mild handler for long, and Clint had been his charge for a long time before Natasha showed up. He respected Clint’s reticence with the power, keeping it both from common knowledge and from use.

Phil would mirror Clint’s hands-behind-the-back stance whenever they were together, making it seem more like an affectation than anything special about Clint. Phil was gone, though, and with him the protective barrier he had always formed.

“We didn’t get the chance to meet formally; Steve Rogers.” Steve held out a large, broad palm expectantly. They had fought aliens as a team, they had eaten improbable fast food afterwards, and then they had, quite literally, collapsed. SHIELD medical was not the place Clint wanted to meet Captain America, but he rarely got exactly what he wanted. Clint smiled placatingly and tried to look as though he wasn’t avoiding contact, mainly by balling his fists into the military woolen blankets.

Steve’s face fell just a bit with his hand. Steve wasn’t naturally an extroverted guy - he could command, but friendship and camaraderie were really difficult for him, especially since he awoke. He and Clint had had chemistry while on the field of battle, but it seemed that wouldn’t translate to everyday life.

“I never got the chance to say thanks. For trusting me,” Clint blurted out, not wanting to see the continued fall of _Captain America’s_ face. “You probably shouldn’t have, but thanks. I... needed that.”

Steve nodded, unconsciously mirroring Clint’s balled fists.

\--

Nuclear material and Bruce shouldn’t be in the same zip code.

“Get out of here,” Bruce insisted through clenched teeth.

Clint unclipped his shooting glove and tossed it aside. “Bruce, if you go off here it won’t matter where I am.” A pained look flashed across Bruce’s face. Clint could pinpoint the moment when Bruce gave up, the sag of heartbreak and helplessness weighing down his features. “Hold on,” Clint warned, gripping the scientist’s face firmly.

Emotion slammed into him, the full-body impact and a sharp crack in his head leaving Clint dazed. Through sheer force of will he held on, gritting his teeth through it. He’d entered the contact armed with memories of safety and calm which he pushed through his palms. The Hulk roared around his mind, rage and fear and confusion an almost physical maelstrom under his hands. Suppression wasn’t going to work. Calming feelings weren’t going to work. Clint pushed harder and harder against the Hulk with memories of safe places and tranquil moments, already scarce in Clint’s life. In a maneuver Clint was unsure would work until the moment he initiated it, he let up the psychic pressure. The Hulk’s rage rushed into him as he slipped a last sip of calm through to Bruce in the void left by the Hulk.

It felt like breathing fire. It felt like drowning. It felt like he might explode. He keeled over with a ragged sob. He had been screaming or roaring without realizing it. The break in contact hurt. Everything hurt. Bruce was at his side, checking his eyes and pulse.

“Clint, what was that?” Bruce no longer radiated anger.

Clint groaned. “Really?” The Hulk burned up his insides and felt as though he was trying to push and stretch out Clint’s psyche.

“Are you okay? What can I do?”

Clint tried to roll to his hands and knees, but he only managed to throw up. Bruce supported him while his stomach emptied, rubbing his back. Clint rolled face-up once more, scooting away from the pool of vomit. “Just give me a minute.”

“What was that? It felt like you pulled the Hulk right out of me.”

Clint made jazz hands at Bruce. “Mutant,” he said simply.

“Wait, really?”

“Uh-huh,” Clint grunted, pressing his fists to his temples trying to squeeze his escaping brains back into his head.

“You’re a _telepath_?” Bruce asked, disbelieving and sounding just a bit betrayed.

“Empath,” Clint corrected.

“Huh,” Bruce left a hand on Clint’s chest to be certain he continued breathing. “Does SHIELD-”

“No. Coulson knew. And Natasha.” Clint was feeling better - it still felt as though he’d swallowed gasoline, but he didn’t feel carried away with it any longer.

“Isn’t that something that-”

“It’s not that strong of a power. It’s not relevant, and SHIELD has strict regs with muties.”

Bruce scrubbed a hand through his hair. “It felt pretty powerful.”

Clint smiled. “Yeah?”

“Yeah.”

“Well don’t get used to it. That hurt worse than getting shot.”

\--

Tony slung a casual arm around Clint’s shoulders. “I got something new I want you to try out.”

Clint perked. “Is it arrows?”

“No,” Tony replied enigmatically.

The ride down to the workshop was peppered with Tony’s usual self-adulation and mile-a-minute theorizing. 

In the lab Tony pulled out a large sheet that looked like contact paper with cartoonish hands outlined on it. “What’s this for?” Clint asked, suddenly suspicious.

“Your woo-woo,” Tony replied, waving his hands around in front of him and bugging out his eyes. Clint stared at Tony, unamused. “Bruce spilled the beans. Well, he didn’t really spill so much as let slip with a comment that I don’t think—” Tony cut himself off frowning. “I had JARVIS review all our video of you and never once did you touch someone, but you let other folks touch you. I figured it was something specific to your palms.” Clint narrowed his eyes at Tony. “It’s a new polymer I developed for chemical exposure situations, but I think it should do the trick. Give it a shot - just press down and it will laminate to your skin.” Tony pressed his own hands flat on the tabletop in demonstration.

Clint frowned, but did as requested, pressing over the cartoon hands on the paper. A thin layer of something that had been adhered to the paper came up with his hands when he pulled them back. The stuff was near invisible and didn’t feel too strange. He could probably shoot with it on. Clint rubbed his fingertips together contemplatively. “Not bad.”

Tony sighed gustily. “You invent a polymer for a guy and ‘not bad’ is all he has to say.”

“You said it was for—”

“Look, the Avengers are going to be more in the public eye in the next few months. You’re going to be expected to do PR and press junkets and all that shit. I didn’t want you flinching away every time someone tried to shake your hand. Which, speaking of--” Tony stuck out his hand. Clint eyed it, openly distrustful. Tony rolled his eyes and that was enough; Clint shook. Through the material he could feel the rough skin and sturdy muscle in Tony’s hand, but no emotional leakage.

Clint smiled. “This stuff really does work.”

Tony smiled right back, looking as though he really meant it.

\--

“Hey, Steve?” Clint asked hesitantly. Steve looked up from where he was polishing his dress shoes.

“Yeah?”

“Can we talk for a minute?”

“Sure.” Steve put aside his shoe and turned the full force of his focus on Clint. They worked together well enough in combat, but their friendship hadn’t bloomed like it had between Steve and Tony or Natasha. Part of it was trauma and grief on Clint’s part, but a lot of it... Clint was a man who kept his secrets close, and though Steve could respect that, he couldn’t quite accept it from a team member.

“I—” Clint scrubbed at the back of his head. “Look, I feel like we got off on the wrong foot somewhere and I wanted to explain why...” He trailed off looking a bit lost. Steve was watching him intently. “Did your SHIELD update on the future include stuff about mutants?”

“Like Magneto and the Brotherhood?” Steve asked.

“Like, folks with the X-gene.”

Steve shook his head silently.

“So genes are like the blueprints in your cells. Some people have an X-gene that gets turned on and goes through rewriting some of that blueprint.” Clint explained it like Phil had explained it to him; simply and with broad analogies. “Some people have physical changes and some people get abilities beyond the usual and some people get both.”

“Like Magneto.”

“Yeah, but most of them aren’t like— Most mutations are little changes that you couldn’t hurt anybody with. Most of the time it’s just something little that makes a person different.”

“Why are you telling me this?”

Barton thrust his hand out, shoulders bunching in discomfort. Steve looked askance at it. _Get on with it_ , Clint’s expression said. Steve had a lot of experience shaking hands. It was What Was Done back in his day, in greeting, farewell, and congratulations. Add Captain America tours to that and Steve was not just practiced at the action: he was skilled.

Clint’s palm was steely muscle and callouses, and just a touch damp. The strong press of emotion caught him off guard. He tried to pull back at the first sting of apprehension and nauseous fear of rejection, but Clint doubled down and held on. The bite of anxiety gave way to a sort of churning certainty that rejection was imminent. Clint let go and pulled back abruptly.

“What was that?” Steve asked. He was glad he was sitting down; the tidal retreat of emotions not his own left him feeling hollow and baffled.

“I’m a mutant.” Clint’s eyes skittered everywhere but to meet Steve’s. “I just— it seemed like you should know, what with being team leader and everything. Bruce and... the others already knew and it didn’t seem right.”

Steve’s expression softened. “I’m not sure I entirely understand what went on there. Could you maybe explain it to me?” 

Clint ducked his head and looked at Steve almost coyly. In that instant, Steve recalled the thread of desire for approval that had wound through the confusing, painful jumble he had experienced. “I really don’t know too much about it,” Clint began.


	2. Coda

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Warning for major character death.

Clint never achieved what could be called _control_ over his power. Turning it on and off was something he learned he should have been capable of, but he never got the knack.

Clint lived life riding his luck hard. He understood that one day he wouldn’t be fast enough, good enough, or lucky enough. His team wouldn’t be close enough. Fate would measure out the thread of his life, snarled knots and all, line up her shears, and declare the end.

Natasha reached him so soon after the fall. He was relatively certain there was something driven through one of his lungs, and he couldn’t feel anything below his belly button. Natasha’s eyes raked over his as she radioed it in. She knelt by his head.

“You’ll be fine, Clint. Medics are en route.”

Clint tried to say, “You’re a terrible liar,” but there was blood in his mouth and his lungs wouldn’t work. He managed to open and close his hand. She got the idea, ripping off his shooting glove, peeling off the thin polymer protector, and grasping his hand in both of hers. She tried to share something soft and painless.

The pain through the link was a dull roar in the background, insignificant in a wash of love and wonder and gratitude. Clint’s lips moved weakly and a sharp lance of panic at the feeling of drowning flashed through her. Abruptly the link cut off. Natasha tried to chase after him, gripping Clint’s hand so hard the fingers turned purple.

Clint looked up at her with a terrifying clarity. He barely shook his head, and slipped away.

Natasha let out a keening, animal scream. Tony landed moments later. He took in the palm-sized curl of plastic and Natasha’s wild scream. He popped his helmet and knelt, tried to enclose her in an armored embrace.

“Don’t you run away from me, you fucking coward!” she screamed at Clint’s corpse. “Don’t you—”

“Natasha, stop.”

“He cut me out,” Natasha hissed.

“He wouldn’t take you with him,” Tony chastised. In her own terrifying away, Natasha’s emotions shut off. She dropped Clint’s hand in horror. Her grip had broken several of his metatarsals. “It would have killed you too.”

“He cut me out,” she said again, broken and quiet.

_“Iron Man, we need you **now** ,”_ Steve’s voice was urgent on the comm.

“Natasha, will you—”

“Go.” He hesitated a moment. “Just _go_.” Tony blasted off towards the fight. Natasha reached out and took Clint’s broken hand. She stretched the fingers out, oh so carefully, and pressed it to her cheek, reaching for something that was irrefutably gone.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I found that remarkably hard to write so thanks for sticking to and reading it. Hope you enjoyed!

**Works inspired by this one:**

  * [Touch me deep [PODFIC]](https://archiveofourown.org/works/1676102) by [daroos](https://archiveofourown.org/users/daroos/pseuds/daroos)




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